


if there's a rocket, tie me to it

by aliceinacoma



Category: To All the Boys I've Loved Before Series - Jenny Han, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before (2018)
Genre: AU, F/M, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-05
Updated: 2018-12-05
Packaged: 2019-09-11 23:44:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,812
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16862224
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aliceinacoma/pseuds/aliceinacoma
Summary: A week later, she’s dating come college boy, and he’s getting jumped by Lara Jean Covey on the track, which is…not how he expected junior year to go.--The one where they aren't soulmates.





	if there's a rocket, tie me to it

**Author's Note:**

> song title from snow patrol's song of the same name

Gen’s got this faded line that runs from just below her ear down her neck to stop just above the spot where her shoulder meets her neck. He’s spent hours teasing along the line with his tongue, an act of worship to one of the softer parts of an otherwise steely teenage girl.

As a kid, she used to do everything in her power to cover the line: turtlenecks, concealer, hair always down. It was embarrassing, really, a public display of one of the few things she’d never be able to control, until, one day, she looked at Peter Kavnisky and saw he had one too. One long, single streak from his ear to his collarbone, a mirror image of her own. Suddenly, the mark was a source of pride.

It’s how Peter knows they’re soulmates.

The day he found out Gen was his soulmate, the day she lured him up to the treehouse to show him, he marveled at how easy it was. Some people search their whole lives for their matching mark. Most never find it. Yet here he was, all of twelve years old, living three blocks from his soulmate the whole time.

He’s always been blessed like that.

They fall naturally into a relationship, each finding supreme comfort in the fact that, whatever else might happen, they never have to face the world alone. It’s a relief to a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

He counts himself incredibly lucky in this department. It doesn’t always happen this way, being romantically matched with one’s soulmate. Like Lara Jean and Chris. He remembers when they found their marks, win ovals just under their belly buttons. It was back in sixth grade, when they were all still the summer neighborhood gang.

Squealing, the girls embraced fiercely.

“Thank god!” crowed Chris. “Cause I’m planning on having so many _lovahs_.”

Lara Jean simply smiled her sweet smile. “I’m so glad it’s you, Chris.”

She didn’t notice the way Gen’s smile hardened, but he did. Soulmates always notice everything.

—

Then again, soulmates also don’t break up, yet here he is, sitting on the bleachers, listening to her say things like, “space,” and “still be friends.”

His jaw tightens. “It’s not supposed to work like that. We’re…” His fingers ghost over his own mark, and for a second her eyes soften before she shakes her head, determined.

“I don’t think I really believe in that,” she tells him, her lips pursing into a holier-than-thou pucker.

A week later, she’s dating come college boy, and he’s getting jumped by Lara Jean Covey on the track, which is…not how he expected junior year to go.

—

Twelve-year-old Lara Jean had handwriting like some kind of Victorian lady: curly-cues at the end of her _s_ es and a flourish on the cross of the _t_. It’s the detail that strikes Peter, how clearly she cares for the words, enough to make them pretty.

Pretty _mean_. He so did not always take the last slice of pizza.

(Later, playing video games at Greg’s, he catches himself reaching for that last piece of pepperoni and stops for half a millisecond before grabbing it and stuffing it into his mouth because, so what, Covey? He can take the last slice sometimes.)

—

Soulmates aside, Peter tries not to put too much stock in fate, but when Mr. Kennison calls out the name “Lara Jean” as his lab partner, he wonders if maybe the universe is trying to tell him something.

He flashes her his most charming smile, but she only rolls her eyes in return, reluctantly shuffling over to his table.

“Well, well, well, Covey,” he says as everyone begins pulling out supplies for the experiment. “Back for more?”

She has the decency, at least, to flush at the mention of their liaison on the track. “Ah, yeah, sorry about that. I just, uh, needed to get out of a…very awkward situation.”

“And jumping me was _less_ awkward?”

She nods vigorously. “Absolutely.”

“I’m…touched, I think,” he replies. “Or insulted, I don’t know which.” That drags a smile out of her. “So…why have you been avoiding me, then?”

Her smile turns immediately into a frown. “I’m not avoiding you.”

He wonders how true that is; it’s not like he and Covey are particularly close anymore. There are whole weeks he doesn’t say one word to her beyond the occasional, “Hey,” as they pass each other in the halls. But the past two days, he’s felt, somehow, like he’s seen less of her than usual. Or maybe it’s that she wasn’t a presence for him to miss or even notice, and now, suddenly, somewhat off-puttingly, she is. Not in the painful way of Gen but enough that he looks around for her when he enters a room, the way he might for Greg.

All because she said his eyes have “golden flecks in them.” How ridiculously pathetic of him.

“You definitely are,” he insists.

“I think you’re confusing me not swooning every time you enter the room with ignoring,” she quips. “Not every girl thinks you’re the sun and the moon, Peter.”

His eyebrows shoot up into his hair. Who knew the girl had bite?

“And yet,” he teases. “ _You’re_ the only girl who’s written me a love letter.”

A genuine smile forms on her lips, though she tries to stamp it down. “That was a long time ago. And besides, you were never supposed to see that.” A thought occurs to her and she pauses in her perusal of the lab directions. “Which…um, could I possibly have it back?”

He pulls the letter out from his back pocket - not that he’s been carrying it around but okay, yes, he’s kind of been carrying it around. It’s a nice ego boost whenever Gen posts about her stupid new boyfriend on Instagram. “You mean you want this back?” he asks, holding it up.

She snatches at the letter, narrowly missing as he jerks it away, holding it high above her head.

“Give it back!” she demands, jumping up to grab at it. Peter laughs, which only increases her fervor, and they end up in a full-on tustle right in the middle of Chemistry. Mr. Kennison rushes over to break them up.

“Mr. Kavinsky, Ms. Covey, is there a problem here?” he asks sternly. They separate quickly, chastised.

“No, sir,” Peter answers with his best Peter smile. “Mr. Kennison shakes his head but walks away to help another student. As soon as he’s gone, Lara Jean smacks Peter in the chest.

“Ow!”

“Jerk,” she scolds, returning to the lab. Peter rubs his chest where she struck him, but he can’t help his grin.

“Aw, you love me.”

She shakes her head but doesn’t answer, and it’s smiling down at her when he finally feels Gen’s eyes on him from across the room; sure enough, when she dares to glance in her direction, she’s glaring daggers between him and LJ.

 _Huh_. Well, _there’s_ an idea.

Leaning over to Lara Jean, close enough that he can feel the heat radiate off of her - not that he’s looking - flawlessly smooth skin.

“Okay, Covey, I’ll make you a deal.”

She glances sidelong at him through dark lashes.

“I’ll give you the letter back,” he whispers, “if you let me drive you home today.”

Her eyes narrow suspiciously - damn, this girl does not buy into his brand at all - but she nods anyway.

“Fine,” she concedes. “But no funny business.”

Peter winks at her and laughs when she stomps on his foot in return.

—

“No.”

“Covey, hear me out.”

“My answer is no, Peter.”

“But why?”

“Because it’s weird.”

“It’s weird to date, excuse me fake-date, the hottest guy in school?”

“You are the most arrogant - and you’re not the hottest!”

“Who is then?”

“…”

“See? I’m the hottest. Even you, Miss Totally-Immune-to-My-Charms, even you have to admit it.”

“Over my dead body.”

“Come on, Covey. You wanna get Sanderson off your back. I want to show Gen that if she can move on, so can I.”

“Except you’re not.”

“Well, yeah, no, but she doesn’t need to know that. So come on. Let’s help each other out?”

Lara Jean chews on her bottom lip for a solid thirty seconds, considering, which creates some sort of foreign but not unpleasnt commotion in the pit of his stomach. He doesn’t look away, just licks his own lips and throws her his best puppy dog eyes.

“Please?” he pleads.

She rolls her eyes and sighs, and Peter knows he’s won.

“Fine,” she agrees. “But there will be rules.”

“You’re the boss,” he replies.

—

What’s odd about Lara Jean is how easy it is just to exist around her. Even when she’s judging him, there’s such an automatic compassion emanating from her that he doesn’t feel foolish when he starts rambling about _Gen_ and _soulmates_.

And, okay, he rambles about that a lot.

“I just don’t know how she could say she doesn’t believe in them,” he moans one day as he drives them away from a rather disastrous party at Greg’s. Disastrous mostly because Gen had the audacity to bring her hunky college beau along. Lara Jean forced him out the door before he could fight the dude, or, probably more accurately, cry. “And what about that guy, Geoff or James or whatever! I mean, who does he think he is, dating somebody else’s soulmate?”

Lara Jean, settled in the passenger’s seat of his jeep, smiles at him now, bemused.

“What?” he asks.

“Nothing. Just…you’re different than I thought,” she admits with a shrug.

Peter shakes his head, grinning because, well, yeah, ditto. The mythos about Lara Jean has always been that she’s this naive little fairy of a girl, but the more time they spend together, the more he realizes that she’s not naive, she’s just soft. Warm.

Lovely, really. The kind of girl who belongs curled up on a couch with fuzzy socks and cocoa.

She’s the stark opposite of Gen, and Peter marvels at the fact they were ever friends, even in childhood. Gen’s all harsh lines and diamonds. He’s always been taken with that edge of hers, with the vulnerability he knows is buried underneath, but Lara Jean’s all wandering curves and first snowfalls, and, frankly, it’s a nice change of pace, contract or no contact.

“What do you mean?” he asks her as he pulls up in front of her house.

“I just never thought you’d be so into soulmates,” she explains. “It’s kind of…sweet.”

He just shrugs, a little embarrassed to have her looking at him that way, that hint of pity in the corner of her eyes.He asks, “Are you ever sad? That your soulmate isn’t a romantic match for you?”

She shakes her head, certain. “Chris is my soulmate, through and through., and I wouldn’t have it any other way. I mean, I can still fall in love, and…” She pauses, catching herself.

“And?” Peter presses.

“I don’t know if I’d like knowing I was _supposed_ to fall for someone. I’d just spend all my time wondering if _this_ was the person, when I was going to meet them, how. This way it’s an adventure, and I also kind of have a choice in the matter.” She looks over at him and adds quickly, “Not that there’s anything wrong with romantic soulmates.”

For not the first time in the past few weeks, Peter looks at her, really looks. In the dark, a halo of light from her house in the background has formed around her profile, and even in the shadows, her eyes finding his makes his heart hurry its pace, like it’s running a race with his brain.

“No, it’s okay,” he says finally. “I think I know what you mean.”

She flashes him a smile, unbuckling her seatbelt to clamber out of the jeep.

“Thanks for the ride,” she says.

“Thanks for coming,” he replies. Then, because he can’t get, ‘Goodnight,’ out, he says, “Uh, are you doing anything right now?”

She frowns, bewildered. “I guess not?”

“Cool. Um. Do you want to… I mean, it’s only 10, I don’t have to be home til one, so maybe we could, like, you know, hang out?”

Dear god, he’s flustered. Since when does he get flustered?

Lara Jean tilts her head in consideration.

“Sure,” she replies finally. “I’d like that.”

_I’d like that._

Three words have never made him grin harder.

—

On Saturdays, his mom is at the shop, so generally care of Own falls to Peter, which tends to mean hours of mindless video game and trashy movies. No surprise, his mom always scolds him about destroying Owen’s mind with “that crap.”

It’s Lara Jean’s idea that they start spending the odd Saturday at Covey Corner - Peter’s nickname, not LJ’s. At first, she claims she wants to introduce Kitty and Owen, but that dream is squashed when Kitty announces, “We’re in homeroom together, Lara Jean.” She does invite Owen to watch her shows with her, though, so maybe there’s something to it after all.

It doesn’t take too long for Owen to demand Covey sister time every Saturday, and Peter couldn’t really argue even if he wanted to. There’s something about the Coveys that’s infectious. Their house is a nest of warmth, and once you’ve been welcomed in, it’s nearly impossible to extract yourself willingly.

Peter likes to think he’s been welcomed with open arms.

So Saturdays become Covey days, just like his Monday to Fridays. They curl up on the couch to binge New Girl (“I’m totally a CC,” he insists when she teases him about his Coach-like tendencies) or get Owen and Kitty to play Codenames (the youngest Covey is terrifyingly masterful at this) or attempt to bake the perfect cookie (though, of course, all of LJ’s baking tastes heavenly). Sometimes, they study together, alone in her room, and he likes those times best, away from other people, where he can drop his guard and just be. Something bright and a little thrilling blooms in the center of his chest every time he enters her room. Something he likes, even if he can’t quite admit it to himself.

Her books spread out around her on the floor in every direction, she catches him staring at her, a habit he really needs to stamp out, like yesterday. “What?”

Rather than directly answer her ( _you’re pretty in blue_ ), he says, “It’s weird. If Gen hadn’t dumped me, we never would have become friends.”

Lara Jean keeps the straightest face when she asks, “We’re friends?” then loses it at the automatic puppy dog eyes he gives back.

“Just kidding,” she assures him, crawling up onto the bed next to him. They lie shoulder to shoulder, staring up at the plastic glow-in-the-dark stars that cover her ceiling.

“It is kind of weird,” she says. “I…I’m glad we’re friends, Peter.” She smiles up at him, that true smile of hers, and he reaches out to squeeze her hand.

“Me too,” he responds softly.

His hand lingers on hers just a moment too long, but neither one of them mentions it.

—

He gets why the No Kissing rule is in the contract; he respects that she wants her ‘firsts’ to be real, even feels a little bad that he’s ruining so many of them. But the longer they keep this whole thing up, the more he has to actively remind himself not to kiss her every time she does something cute.

Not that he thinks she’s cute. Cause, god, that would be…inconvenient.

It’s just like, when she’s anxious, she braids her hair, and she studies with her head hanging off the edge of the bed and eats cookies one tiny bite at a time to really savor it, and, well, he’s only human after all.

And then there are the more obvious situations, like when they get forced into a closet at Greg’s during a party to play Seven Minutes in Heaven. They both protest furiously, but there’s no stopping the cackling lacrosse players, so here they are, locked in the tiniest closet ever made, a mere breath’s distance from one another. He tries to give them each some room by leaning against the wall, but somehow that’s worse because then her mouth is less than a foot away from his mouth, and he shouldn’t be thinking about that but he kind of is.

He kind of wants to kiss her again.

He hasn’t forgotten how soft her mouth was on his that day she pushed him down on the track. His shock precluded him from reciprocation, but it was enough to know that she’d probably be fun to make out with.

Which is the last thing he should be thinking about, trapped in a closet with her.

“You okay?” she asks, her mouth curving into a teasing smile.

“Hm? Fine. Fine,” he says, forcing his eyes away from her mouth. “How dumb is it that our names got pulled, huh? I’m surprised the guys let that slide.”

“Too bad it wasn’t Gen,” she says thoughtfully.

“You wanted to make out with Gen?” he teases, and she rolls her eyes.

“Nope, but you do.”

Reaching out, he wraps a few strands of her hair around his index finger. “Probably good. I don’t think your styles really would’ve mixed well.”

Her eyebrows shoot up, and even he has to admit this conversation is getting a little reckless, turning off into dangerous territory, but for the life of him he can’t remember what he’s supposed to be wary of. “And exactly how would you know anything about my…’style’?” she asks, that secret boldness of hers flashing in her eyes, even as a blush blooms across her cheeks.

“Well, by my count, we’ve now kissed twice,” he says, tugging gently at her hair until she follows his lead, stepping closer until she’s caught between his legs. “So I think I have a pretty good idea.”

Her eyes don’t leave his, and he can see the fear building underneath the surface. Still, she doesn’t move. “Okay, Kavnisky, if you’re such an expert, what, exactly, is my ‘style’?”

He pauses, her hair still caught around her fingers. If this were some sort of romantic comedy, this would be the part where he told her about how perfect her mouth is, about the way she manages to be sweet and yielding and needy at the same time. He’d tell her he needs another test sample to ensure his data is correct, and they really would make out in this tiny-ass closet for how many ever minutes they had left in this dumb game.

Except then there’s Gen. His soulmate. Somewhere on the other side of the door, not waiting for him, he supposes, except in the way soulmates always do.

And Lara Jean’s a girl who deserves to be more than a casualty.

“Sloppy,” he tells her with a smirk, and she hits him on the shoulder, hard, before they both fall into a fit of giggles that’s only broken up when Greg opens the door to tell them their seven minutes are up.

"Please tell me y'all made out for a least three of those minutes," he says, frowning at them. Lara Jean and Peter both nod very seriously. 

"Absolutely," she says at the same time as he says, "At least three."

Greg shakes his head as they burst out laughing again. 

—

The contract says nothing about concerts, but he thought Covey would be happy to go with him. Somehow his instincts with this girl are way off base.

"Covey, come on, you have to go with me!”

“I don’t _have_ to do anything, Peter!”

“You don’t want to go with me? To see Taylor Swift? In concert? Excuse me, but who are you and what have you done with Lara Jean Covey?”

She rolls her eyes, good-natured, and readjusts her ponytail. “How’d you even get those tickets? They’ve been sold out for months.”

Looking away, he begrudgingly admits, “They were for Gen’s birthday.”

Lara Jean’s eyes widen. “Oh my god! Peter!”

He groans, his head in his hands. “I know.”

“Well, you have to take her,” she insists, which, well, that wasn’t really the response he was expecting. He thought she’d roll her eyes, make some comment about being a good fake girlfriend, and agree to go.

“What?” he asks. _Take Gen_? He hadn’t even thought of it, but if he’s being honest, it’s not the worst plan. The longer they’ve been separated, the more he can see it’s eating at her that he’s spending all this time with Lara Jean. Plan’s working perfectly, really. Showing up to her house with concert tickets for her birthday? Totally a seal-the-deal move.

One he never even considered.

“No,” he says automatically. “I can’t… She’s still with that stupid college guy.”

“Are you sure?” Lara Jean asks, skeptical, and, no, he’s not actually sure. She hasn’t posted about the new boyfriend in a while. Even if she had, would Peter have even noticed? He’s gotten to engrossed in this whole facade, he’s sort of lost track of the _why_ of it all.

“That’s not the point,” he insists firmly. “I’m not just gonna go crawling back to her with some big gesture like that. If she wants me, she’ll come get me.”

“How romantic,” Lara Jean says, sarcastic. Peter shrugs.

“Well, romance has never been my strong point with Gen,” he mutters. Lara Jean laughs at that, incredulous but not mean.

“Peter, you’re like the most romantic person I’ve ever met,” she tells him, a blush spreading across her face. He wonders if she can see it mirrored on his own cheeks. “Maybe…have you ever thought…maybe it’s Gen?”

“Excuse me?”

“It’s just - are you sure you really actually want to _be_ with Gen?”

There’s more of a question, buried underneath her words, but she doesn’t quite ask it, so he doesn’t quite answer it, either.

“I don’t think I really have a choice.”

(They go to the concert, and he posts a hundred photos on Instagram, and _make Gen feel miserable_ is only like the fourth reason on the list, somewhere after _Lara Jean’s smile_.)

—

It’s so good until it’s so not. So much of him has forgotten this is some kind of bizarre game, most especially his body. He’s started to reach for her instinctively when she enters the room, his arms wrapping around her even when no one is there to notice. And she lets him, until one day she doesn’t.

“Stop,” she says, ducking out of his embrace. They’re in her living room, alone, a movie playing on the TV, and she’s scooting away from like he has the plague. “You have to stop.”

“I’m sorry. Did I - are you okay?” he asks, genuine confusion - and, yeah, that’s terror - forming in his chest because, god, did he hurt her or something?

“Peter, we can’t keep doing this,” she says plainly. “When are you going to get back with Gen?”

He’s dumbfounded. Where the hell is this coming from? He thought they were having a nice evening, and now she’s demanding he have some sort of schedule for getting back with Gen?

“I don’t know,” he says. “Whenever she…comes to her sense, I guess.”

“Oh, good, so you’ll just keep fake-dating me until she wants you again,” she snaps, pulling a pillow to her chest. She angles her body away from him, so he couldn’t reach out to comfort her if he tried, and god he wants to try. He arms ache for her like a missing limb.

“Lara Jean, what’s wrong?” he asks, using her whole name so she knows he’s taking this seriously. “That’s the contract, right?”

“Oh and cuddling? Where’s that in the contract?” she asks, meaningfully. He doesn’t take the bait like he should.

“I like cuddling with you,” he says brightly. “You should be a professional cuddler.” He dares, here, to scoot closer to her so he can flick her ponytail once, affectionate.

Her eyes fill with a yearning he’s never seen on anyone before. Gently, she strokes his face, her fingers lingering at his jawline. “I like it too,” she admits quietly. “That’s the problem.” Taking her hand from his face, she says, certain, “I deserve to be more than someone’s fake girlfriend.”

It almost comes tumbling out of his lips, _Of course you do. You already are. Can I just kiss you already?_ but he thinks of Gen, all of twelve, pulling aside her turtle neck to show him her mark and stops himself. For the first time, he notices how tired Lara Jean is - not sleep deprived but at her metaphorical wit’s end. It hasn’t occurred to him that this might all be wearing on her, the whole charade. Maybe because he’s never felt so awake.

“Yeah,” he says finally. “You do. Sorry. I’ll - I’ll work it out with Gen.”

Any last trace of hope leaves her eyes. “Okay,” she says, and he wonders if he’s not so lucky after all, in love with one girl but destined for another.

—

This is his third time going on the Ski Trip, and for the first time, he’s not looking forward to it. At this point, everybody knows he and Covey aren’t seeing each other any more. They throw him enough sympathetic looks in the hallway that Peter almost forgets to feel bad for himself. Even though, God, does he.

Gen’s in fine form all weekend: sitting next to him on the bus, touching his arm flirtatiously. Peter’s glad LJ isn’t here to see this; it would only hurt her feelings more, and he’s sure he’s done more than enough of that.

Will they still be friends, after everything returns to normal?

That question ruins his weekend. He can’t stop thinking about it. No matter what way he spins it, he can’t see that friendship ever flourishing. Even with her deep well of compassion, Lara Jean isn’t going to want to be friends with Peter, the soulmate of her nemesis. And is that even what he would want, to be her friend, to watch some other guy sweep her off her feet into the sunset?

Gen’s grand finale of the trip is to invite him to join her in the hot tub, which he agrees to because, well, it’s what he should do, really. The other boys holler when they find out where he’s going, but Greg, in the middle of mixing himself a drink, just shakes his head.

“What?” Peter asks. “You got a problem, man?”

“No,” Greg says, shrugging. “Seems like you’re the one with the problem.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

Greg rolls his eyes. “Dude, why’s it always gotta be Gen? What has she ever done for you?”

Peter laughs, incredulous. “What has she…she’s my soulmate!”

“And?” Greg asks, dubious. “You ever think, man, maybe your soulmate isn’t somebody you’re supposed to spend forever with? Maybe your soulmate can be a warning, sometimes.” He doesn’t wait for Peter’s answer before he exits into the other room, drink in hand.

Peter’s hand drifts to his mark. The thing that started all this nonsense in the first place, really. A simple, faded line from his ear to his collarbone that’s supposed to decide his fate. How had he never questioned that before? How had he never paused to ask himself if he even wanted a soulmate in the first place? There’s something Lara Jean said, about choices, that’s stuck in his brain since that night in the car.

“ _If I fall in love, I want it to be my choice_.”

And here it is, finally: he can choose Gen and continue down this tumultuous but predictable spiral, or he can take a chance and choose Lara Jean.

There’s really no competition, is there?

Grabbing his phone, he texts Gen that he’s on his way.

—

The bus driver can’t go fast enough on their way home. Peter’s convinced someone - most likely Gen - paid him to torture him by driving as slowly as humanly possible.

“You’ve gotta chill, dude,” Greg tells him an hour out from the school. “She’s just a girl, you know.”

Peter glares at him, but doesn’t say anything because anything he could say would just be embarrassing, like how she’s the girl, the only girl he wants to look at for a long, long time.

Greg must be able to read his mind because he grins. “Yeah, I miss her baking too,” he admits.

Somehow, they arrive at the school, and Peter dashes like a madman to his car, nearly forgotten his bag. Greg calls out after him, “Tell Largie I except some baked goods at lunch tomorrow!” but Peter’s in too much of a hurry to respond.

Who knows how fast over the speed limit he drives? He pulls up to the Covey house in record time, barely putting the car into park before he’s on the porch, ringing the doorbell in a fury. It swings open moments letter to reveal little LJ, bewildered and annoyed at his desperation. Her expression brightens when she realizes it’s him.

“Peter!” she cries happily. “What’re you doing here?”

“Is LJ around?” he asks. Kitty shakes her head.

“She went out with Chris,” she explains.

He groans. “Do you know when she’ll be back?”

“No idea.” She opens the door wider, a too-coy look on her face that only means trouble. “Do you want to come in? You can wait for her here if you want.”

Even though he wants to go tearing up the town to find her, he nods and follows the youngest Covey into the living room. This is better, really. Now he’ll be here when she gets back, and they won’t miss each other again. He throws himself onto the couch, Kitty settling in a few feet away from him.

“So Peter,” she says primly. “What are your intentions with my sister?”

He sits up on one elbow, taken aback. “Uh, what do you mean?”

Kitty rolls her eyes. “Come on, Peter. LJ told me. This whole fake-dating scheme? Pretty brilliant,” she commends him. It’s not the first time that Peter wonders how this eleven year old kid got to be so…grown-up.

“Oh, yeah. Well, it was,” he says. “But…I don’t know, I guess it also wasn’t,” he admits, more to himself than to her. “I think there was always this part of me that knew it wasn’t totally fake, that I wanted it to be real. Even with all the shit with Gen and soulmates I kind of kept hoping Gen wouldn’t ever want me back and Covey and I could just keep dating. But for real.” He puts his right arm over his eyes, the left hanging off the couch. “God, I should have just told her that. Why didn’t I tell her that?”

“Weeeeelllll…you could try it now,” Kitty asks, and Peter sits up, confused.

“Huh?”

Kitty points behind him toward the staircase, and sure enough, there’s Lara Jean, in blue, sitting on the steps, her arms crossed over chest in the protective stance. He freezes, caught, staring at her and a few breaths pass between them before Kitty excuses herself with a, “I’ll just leave you two kids alone,” scurrying out of the room.

“You were sitting there the whole time, huh?” he asks finally. She nods.

“Ski trip didn’t go well?” she asks, a slight tease in her voice.

“I’m pretty sure it went exactly like it was supposed to,” he says, daring, finally, to get up from the couch and take a few tentative steps toward her. “Or, well, exactly like I wanted it to. I’m not so sure I care about how things are supposed to go anymore. Gonna try this whole free will thing.”

Lara Jean smiles. “Good plan.”

He’s about three feet from her now, close enough to reach out and touch but far enough away that he could still conceivably run if he wanted to. He doesn’t really want to, though, now that he’s here. He takes another step forward.

“Peter…” He halts at the anxiety in her voice.

“Lara Jean,” he says. “Please let me… I wanna tell you. On the Ski Trip, Gen and I… It was gonna happen, you know. She wanted it to happen.”

She nods. “And?”

“And…I didn’t. I just spent the whole trip wondering what you were doing or thinking of things I wanted to text you or how horrible it would feel not to drive you to school on Monday. Which is just - I knew that, I knew it the whole time, I should’ve just - “ He cuts himself off. He’s rambling again, and now is not the time to ramble, even if she’s smiling at him like he’s the cutest thing she’s ever seen. “The point is, I told Gen we’re done. She might get me better than anybody else on the planet, but it just doesn’t compare to what you make me feel.”

Crinkling her nose, she asks, “And what’s that?”

“Like I’m falling. Or flying. Both. It doesn’t matter because whichever one it is, you’re right there with me.”

Lara Jean’s smile grows wider, and this time when she says his name it’s with a tenderness he’s never heard before. “She’s still your soulmate,” she reminds him, wary.

He beams. It’s just like he planned. Pulling out the permanent marker he stole from the resort from his back pocket, he holds out his hand.

“Trust me?” he asks, and she places her hand delicately in his. On the side of her left wrist, he draws the tiniest heart, then hands her the marker and holds out his own wrist. She gets it right away, tracing her own heart in a matching spot on his wrist. When she’s finished, he squeezes her hand. “I’m in love with you, Lara Jean,” he promises. “I’ll gladly take no soulmate, if it means I get to be with you. If that’s what you want.”

“You love me?” she asks, her voice squeaky with excitement. He nods vigorously, hopeful.

Lara Jean lets go of his hand, grabbing at his shirt instead. Deliberately, she guides him down towards her so their noses are almost touching. “I’m so glad you’re not my soulmate,” she says, ”cause I’d still choose you every time.”

Her kiss is just the way he remembers: open, giving, soft lips eager to take whatever he’ll give her. It’s truly the perfect kiss, the end to a wonderful love story or the beginning of an even better one. Peter hopes it’s the latter.

They only break apart when Kitty, in true Kitty fashion, cries out, “Gross!” from around the corner, and they both dissolve into a fit of giggles that he hopes lasts a very long time.


End file.
